


In The Night

by Severina



Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Community: tamingthemuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-09
Updated: 2012-09-09
Packaged: 2017-11-13 20:43:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/507535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes it is Glenn’s hands on his skin that wake him, the tips of his fingers trailing lightly over the map of scars and imperfections that mark his body.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In The Night

**Author's Note:**

> Written for LJ's tamingthemuse community, for the prompt 'sculpture'
> 
> * * *

Daryl rarely sleeps through the night. Sometimes it is because of the dreams, nightmare images that jolt him to instant wakefulness, blinking in the musky gloom of the tent, chest rising and falling rapidly until his mind catches up and he realizes that it was only a dream. More often it is the noise of something moving around in the brush outside that has him sitting up and reaching for his crossbow before he’s even fully awake. He listens, muscles tense, until he identifies the steady, careful tread of a possum or a raccoon. Only when he knows that it’s not the lumbering unsteady gait of a walker does he relax his finger on the trigger, prop the bow back against the camp stool and let himself ease back into the sleeping bag, tuck his hand under the old half-filled duffle he’s using as a pillow, curl onto his side and try to sleep.

Sometimes it is Glenn’s hands on his skin that wake him, the tips of his fingers trailing lightly over the map of scars and imperfections that mark his body.

Glenn has never asked about them. Probably never will.

Glenn skims a finger over the long-healed welt between his shoulder blades, and Daryl doesn’t remember what he did to deserve it but he remembers the belt coming down, icy-cold and then hot, so hot; remembers squishing his eyes shut and willing himself not to cry because tears just made it worse; remembers his knuckles turning white as he gripped the edge of the stall, blood flicking on the dirty hay at his feet. 

Glenn turns his hand, brushes his knuckles down his spine to rest on the ridge of scar tissue on his lower back. And Daryl remembers the anticipation he’d felt on the long bus ride home from school, trophy clutched in one fist. He’d never even told Merle and the old man he’d joined the debate club, didn’t want derision to sap his confidence; and he’d squirmed on the cracked seat, still shocked that he’d won, anxious to show off his prize, eager to hear their praise. 

Idiot, he thinks now, as the pads of Glenn’s fingers trace lightly over the scar. Merle had laughed, called him a pansy, a pussy. Had snatched the trophy away, held it up high where Daryl couldn’t reach, and when he’d swiped for it anyway, eyes burning, body shaking, Merle’d just laughed all the more. Daryl remembers lunging, losing his footing, Merle’s boot coming down on his ass to help him along as he stumbled, spinning, into the old cabinet. Ma’s old china rattling as his back scraped along the edge, blinking away the sting of the tears. He remembers everything like it was yesterday.

He shakes his head, shivers into the blanket.

When Glenn leans down and presses his lips softly against the spot, Daryl sighs. And when Glenn’s warm palm pushes gently but insistently at his flank, Daryl rolls obligingly onto his stomach. Tucks his hands under the makeshift pillow, turns his head to the side and lets Glenn’s hands roam unimpeded over his shoulders, down his sides to the swell of his ass. When Glenn’s breath ghosts over his skin he shivers for an entirely different reason. 

The lube is cold and he shudders, feels Glenn’s lips curve into a smile against his shoulder blade. It is only when Glenn’s lean body settles over him that the last of the tension leaves his body. Glenn presses inside, and the memories fade away. All the things that happened in his past are unimportant, inconsequential. All that matters is this, now. Them.


End file.
